with love to indore

Wednesday, June 30, 2010

Thirteen persons hailing from Uttar Pradesh were today arrested on charges of sedition and promoting enmity between groups and cell phones containing inflammatory speeches of militant group Jaish-e-Mohammed founder Maulana Masood Azhar were seized, police said.They were apprehended following a raid at one Majid Khan's place near Laxminagar, Additional Superintendent of Police (ASP) Ramji Shrivastava told reporters.These men were whipping up communal feeling under the grab of selling blankets, he said, adding they hailed from Muzaffarnagar and Baghpat districts.They were booked under IPC Sections 153 (a) (promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion) and 153 (b) (Imputations, assertions, prejudicial to national integration), Shrivastava said.Eleven mobile phones were recovered from the accused and these are being examined, he said. The cell phones contained among other things recordings of Maulana Masood Azhar, police said.

Sunday, June 20, 2010

One more millstone is being put around the neck of Indore public , in the same way as BRTS or Narmada water scheme has been.

Sample this news item from central chronicle

The Union Urban Welfare Ministry has sanctioned Rs 90 crore for the Indore River Side Corridor construction under Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission. Cost of this project is Rs 284 crore. The remaining amount of Rs 194 crore will be borne by the Indore Municipal Corporation from its own resources.Urban Administration and Development Minister Babulal Gaur during his Delhi visit had met Union Urban Welfare Minister Jaipal Reddy in this regard on Friday and had urged him to approve and sanction Rs 142 crore for the Indore Riverside Corridor Project. Gaur urged the Union Urban Welfare Ministry to sanction 50 per cent of the project cost under J N N U R M and under the provisions of the project. Union Urban Development Minister Reddy said that Rs 90 crore of Indore Municipal Corporation is with the department. Therefore, this much amount could be sanctioned. The Indore Municipal Corporation had also requested to sanction funds as per eligibility and had informed that it is ready to spend the remaining amount of Rs 194 crore from its own resources. The River Side Corridor Project is very important for Indore City. After sanctioning the amount it would be easy for the Indore Municipal Corporation to start the work of the Corridor project.Gaur requested Reddy to sanction in future the remaining amount of 50 per cent of the cost of the project, Rs 52 crore. The Indore Municipal Corporation will start the work of the River Side Corridor Project with the sanctioned amount of Rs 90 crore.

1. 90 crore is not new allocation it is amount sanctioned already and lying with urban development ministry as implementation of projects is tardy here.

2. this is a classic case of top down approach. No environmental impact study has been done for project. Current traffic flow in city is west -east . this will be in transverse direction to it.Moreover river flow is already constricted. Now it will be more. IMC itslef has made shops and so called Sanjay Setu alongwith river..what will happen to them?

3.Math is horribly wrong. at one place project cost is 284 crore if 90 crore is given now ,50% of rest 97 crore but Gaur has demanded only 50 crore for later work.

Corrupt and incompetent people at IMC will end up imposing new taxes on people if the project gets implemented.

actually Kamal Patel can be a case study in current degeneration of Indian politics.

1. started from humble base. actually current crop of all BJP leaders in MP were small time workers at the time of Ramjanmbhoomi Andolan.

2.As soon as he become minister within a few days his son attacked apolitical rival with his friends. now here case gets interesting as they say even friendship of wicked is harmful & Dugesh jat learned this hard way. No one was hurt from side of congress leader but this chap who was friend of Kamal Patel's son got injured and died because they could not take him to hospital with bullet marks....

5. comedy of errors start when he went to Jail after CBI inquired into what was an open and shut case. State police had effectively managed to stonewall any investigation into the case.

One could daily read news of him being taken to this hospital to that hospital for check up imaginary illness not to mention even mental disturbance one day.

Finally when he got into jail, all sorts of leaders of BJP kept on coming to pay their obeisance.

lest I forget he is one of those who started their 'public career' in RSS.

so much for probity in public life.Rather than actual act of attack (it is a crime in itself) I find act of effectively sabotaging investigation for 3-4 years (which means police buckles under pressure easily) , his continuation in cabinet ( which means CM is a weakling) to the kind of drama he was able to create with the help of lawyers, doctors and local leaders of BJP.

His guilt is very obvious but all societal actors are oblivious to it. forget shunning him , they are actively working to help him by any hook or crook to get out of net and these are all respectable doctors, lawyers and leaders in society who can be seen talking about values and ethics on normal days.

so the proverbial 'keechad' or mud is actually our society bereft of any moral values.

Friday, June 18, 2010

Question : name the person who can be seen on highest number of posters in the bhopal.

Shivraj singh Chouhan ? NO

Answer is Raaj Dwivedi....one of the highest rank holder JEE from MP (not including bhilai of good old united MP days) in recent memory.

His poster is all pose , waving victory sign, getting bumped by friends, speaking to media etc can be seen on all thoroughfares of Bhopal.

A heartening development indeed because

1.it will inspire many young people to pursue their dreams as it will result in recognition.2.it show that when market is allowed to work freely real talent is recognised.

but..1. no girl can be seen in the victory posters..while they top merit list in all exams..are not they career oriented??

2. this much adulation can increase expectations unrealistically as now whole academic life at iit and afterward lies ahead. Many top ranker in JEE during my college days performed just average in academics and went on to pursue normal careers.

Wednesday, June 16, 2010

some lazy journalist has coined this term and it had become a curse for the area.

1. riots - every riot ends in harming property and business here.result despite having large area on AB road and connected to dhar and pithampur as well this area has not seen real estate boom seen by other areas.

2. despite having some very early colonies of middle class once again no mall or multiplex has come up.

3. Local MLA and now his wife wins with margin of lakh vote . only other area in MP where this happens is babulal gaur in Bhopal and look what he does for development over there contrast this with this area - flyover which was being planned here has been put on cod storage

4. BRTS and ayodhya project has skirted the area

5. roads are being made by passing the area

and now this news about gambling dens. this whole case looks very suspicious from beginning.obviously politicians, bureaucrats and police knew about these gambling dens why they did not act till now and why are they acting now is beyond comprehension.

may be the fellow called their bluff or was not fulfilling their demand.

amidst all the news of burka ban in European countries we must talk about girls (seemingly modern) willingly wearing burka.

When i was a kid no girl in Indore covered her face walking on road. I did see some girls from bohra community donning colorful burkas but they never covered their faces.It was more a fashionable cloth with varied patterns and colors and textures.

by the time i was in high school scooty and other gear less vehicles had become popular for girls and weather was also becoming hotter progressively , so in hot summer afternoon one could see a few girls using their 'dupattas' or chunnis to cover the mouth. It was under acceptable limit and still you could recognize the person in question

but now it has become like we have full fledged burka culture1. it is worn not only on two wheeler but even when they have alighted from it and are in a restaurant or park. clearly effort to hide2. special clothing material large in size are used now3. in all season and all times of day (even night) this is worn.4. obviously it has question of identity in case of crime/ vehicle accidents5. not to mention boys also use similar stuff, mostly it is case of dating right under nose of your acquaintances.

somewhere i read that burka can actually be liberating as the women who might not have ventured outside otherwise would be doing so now. can same thing be said about this fetish for covering face in Indore & Bhopal?what is police doing about it?women commission ? NGOs?

by the time all these authorities sleep let us wait for some major incident to happen because of this new find liberalism in our society.

Monday, June 14, 2010

was planning to write a post on same but this one by Mr Dharkar echoes my thoughts

"The tragedy of Bhopal didn’t happen a second time with the court verdict: it happened at least 26 times, at each anniversary of the worst industrial accident in the world.There are very many points that strike you about this massive human tragedy. Here are some of them, in no particular order:You may also want to see

* GoM on Bhopal will probe circumstances that led to disaster * Bhopal Gas victims plea to Obama for action against Union Carbide * I am not Arjun Singh's official spokesperson, says son Ajay * Bhopal gas tragedy: PM asks Group of Ministers to meet immediately * Buck stops with CBI over Warren Anderson's escape

* Depending on which newspaper you read or which television channel you tune in to, the death toll number has ranged from 15,000 to 20,000. There’s a 25% difference in those figures. If we don’t have a definite figure about deaths, how on earth was compensation paid to the kin of the victims? And if we aren’t even sure of the number of deaths, how very vague will be the much larger figure of those incapacitated by the gas leak! * The tentativeness about these figures suggests either complete carelessness or utter callousness on the part of government authorities. It also suggests that those who were to be compensated did not get what they should have. May be others, not affected at all, were the false beneficiaries with the connivance of officials. * Much attention has been focused on the then Union Carbide chief, Warren Anderson. One news channel in fact was enterprising enough to station its correspondent outside his home in the United States. Much was made about his ‘posh’ house, the ‘exclusive’ suburb it was located in and the stark contrast with the gas victims. That, to me, is missing the point. Anderson is entitled to his perks; after all, he was the head of a large corporation so that would be par for the course. The real question is: was he guilty of wrongdoing? * The same TV channel did manage to get hold of mail exchanges between shop floor employees in the Bhopal Carbide plant and Anderson. They show quite clearly that there was concern amongst Indian engineers about the safety of the plant and that this was overruled by Anderson on grounds of economy. Was this evidence produced earlier? If it wasn’t, why wasn’t it? If it was, how did the courts not take it with the seriousness it deserved and make Anderson the chief accused? * A general point that emerges from this should be of concern to all of us for the future: MNCs will outsource work to countries like India, especially if it is considered hazardous or polluting. Since outsourcing is also done to reduce costs, there will always be a tendency to cut corners, thus increasing the dangers many fold.

As was shown in Bhopal, the Indian engineer cannot overrule his Big Chief. So how does he ensure safety? By whistle blowing to the government factory inspector? What if the factory inspector has been paid off by higher-ranked executives to overlook irregularities?

* Why is there shock and so much hand-wringing at the verdict now? It’s clear that the prosecution (ie the state) framed its case on lesser charges. Under these, punishment could not exceed the two years now awarded by the court. If the court under justice Ahmadi refused the more serious charges to be brought, why didn’t the government appeal? It could have taken the matter to a division bench of the Supreme Court. Didn’t the law ministry think this case big enough to merit its utmost attention? * If the government has come out badly from this, the courts have come off even worse. Why did it take 26 long years for the case to be decided? A case of this magnitude — in fact, the most serious case of human negligence ever to come to court — was treated routinely and kept on the back-burner all these years. Yet courts have been known to fast-track some cases deemed to be important, like some recent assaults on foreigners. Wasn’t Bhopal important? Or do we still think of Indian lives to be cheaper than foreign ones? * The courts, in general, have an antiquated view of compensation to be paid. This is seen in every decision taken by courts at all levels. Just look at the legal costs awarded in routine cases. The amount is paltry enough to be a joke. Aren’t the courts aware of how much real legal costs are? That just tells you how out of sync our judiciary is about the cost of living, about earning capacity and so on. Couldn’t the judges have applied their minds more seriously in the Bhopal case and given compensation of at least 10 times the amount finally awarded? American courts give huge awards and penalties, and Union Carbide was an American company. * The final question has to be about who allowed Warren Anderson to flee. If he was kept in custody, as he should have been, if serious charges were brought against him as they should have been, the victims of Bhopal wouldn’t be left high and dry as they have been.

No one can bring to life the thousands who died or alleviate the pain of those who suffer physical disabilities even today. But fair compensation could have eased the pain a bit. And massive penalties would have ensured that the Andersons of the world would be less callous about the loss of human lives."